Sylva Bernardová

“My dad was listening to a radio and a person who was stammering, stuttering, and taking breaks was speaking on it. Our dad, who was used to coherent speech, called the radio and as it was polite, he introduced himself with his whole name. And he told the editor to get that drunk off the microphone because one could not listen to it. Mr. editor told him to calm down and that it was Prime Minister Klement Gottwald speaking. We then discussed what would happen. In the beginning, dad was not scared but then we were afraid that the editor would denounce him, and someone would come but nothing happened. The editor was probably a very decent person. Because they would have found everyone by their name.”

“I was playing with a typical wooden toy kitchen of that time. It had a table, a washing table, small chairs… I can still see it. The sirens suddenly sounded, my mum took me and told me we had to go to the boiler room. And I screamed that I wanted to clean the little furniture because the door stayed open. Mum said no, took me into her arms and we ran to the boiler room. There were more people there and a pile of coal. You could hear horrible bangs and the metal door was shaking and rattling in a way that terrified me. I know for sure that I was crying, and that people comforted me, and they laid down an old coat on the coal and they let me fall asleep there. I might have slept through it, but I do not know anymore.”